2024 Paris Olympics

[Underdog 28543]

5 minutes ago, flatdawgs said:

I've always loved the Olympics and have been fortunate enough to have attended 3 Winter Games (Cortina 2026 is a bucket list one and hopefully will make that as well). Not been to the Summer Games yet but LA is just down the coast so hope to make that too.

Do yourselves a favor - if you have any chance at all to go to any Olympics, do it. Go to some rando events - generally speaking they're quite affordable - and soak up the fact that the entire world is there and it's a party. Normally transportation to the events is straightforward once you're there. I regret not having gone to Paris, but the TV spectacle has been amazing. Well done to the French! 

Bet it's similar to opening round(s) kept March Madness with the different schools/fans in attendance at a tournament site. 

[flatdawgs 1277]

3 minutes ago, Underdog said:

Bet it's similar to opening round(s) kept March Madness with the different schools/fans in attendance at a tournament site. 

Yeah, that's exactly what it's like - just running into people from everywhere all over. The bigger countries have "houses" for their fans and if you can get in (not always that hard) they're a blast. Pretty epic parties. The King of Norway was at their house in Park City when I was there and I think everyone there actually knew him.

[Deej 76748]

54 minutes ago, Firemans4Horn said:

I fell in love again with the Olympics again. Was kind of out on it the last 15 years or so. Was my favorite sporting event as a kid by a mile. 

It has nothing on Battle of the Network Stars. 

[Machinator 32099]

 

[TonyTexas 10504]

1 minute ago, Deej said:

It has nothing on Battle of the Network Stars. 

No. No it doesn’t 

 

[conVINCEd 21469]

10 minutes ago, Deej said:

It has nothing on Battle of the Network Stars. 

What was the one where they had pro athletes running obstacle courses?  That was always fun.

[Underdog 28543]

Superstars

 

[Deej 76748]

Network Stars was like elementary school field day with cigarettes and alcohol. 

 

[conVINCEd 21469]

4 minutes ago, Underdog said:

Superstars

 

Don’t bet against Ronaldo Neimah or Willie Gault.

[Underdog 28543]

Smokin’ Joe Frazier nearly drowned during the swimming event. 

[conVINCEd 21469]

3 minutes ago, Underdog said:

Smokin’ Joe Frazier nearly drowned during the swimming event. 

Some guys are just very specialized.  I know a guy who ran track at UH with Carl Lewis.  The track team was, far obvious reasons, one of the favorites to win the IM flag football championship.   Carl would never play.  They begged him to play, and he finally gave in.  He said Carl was the worst flag football player he has ever seen.  He could run really fast in a straight line, and that was his only athletic talent whatsoever.  He added that Carl was a better at singing.

[Underdog 28543]

LOL… here’s what you tell Carl… go deep… every. damn. time. 

[TonyTexas 10504]

Our high jumper’s decision to have a jump off might cost us the gold medal race. 

[westexhorn 2013]

1 minute ago, TonyTexas said:

Our high jumper’s decision to have a jump off might cost us the gold medal race. 

Furk

[TreatyOak 16311]

Australia is the new Aggy. "if you count gold medals by population and only count the top ten small populations, and tally the medals for only the first week, we won the Olympics!"

[conVINCEd 21469]

1 minute ago, Underdog said:

LOL… here’s what you tell Carl… go deep… every. damn. time. 

Apparently, the odds of him tracking, adjusting, and maneuvering his hands into position to catch the ball were 0.0%.  When they never throw it to him when he’s open by 30 yards the other team would ignore him pretty quickly.

[conVINCEd 21469]

4 minutes ago, TonyTexas said:

Our high jumper’s decision to have a jump off might cost us the gold medal race. 

I get pride. But it’s still a remarkably stupid,choice.  You’re still called an Olympic champion for the rest of your life if you tie.

[hookem2010 2623]

Golds now tied at 37 with China. Do they have more bullshit events to win or should basketball put us over the top?

[UTexasFight 9427]

28 minutes ago, TonyTexas said:

Our high jumper’s decision to have a jump off might cost us the gold medal race. 

Usually best not to start playing that game. 
why not the men’s 4x100 inability to finally figure out how to execute the one thing they haven’t been able to in 2 decades. Or coming within .01 of winning that kayak race this morning, or a ton of other examples.

 

as it is, we’re down one now but should be tied in a couple of hours after this basketball game.

but China will probably take the lead back in the 2nd to last event of the day, Boxing Women’s 75kg.

each country are strong favorites in one event each tomorrow. So that will still leave us needing to win two more to take the count outright. We’d need a volleyball upset over Italy and win one of the wrestling events (looking at Wrestling Men’s freestyle 97kg) to finish on top.

Edited August 10 by UTexasFight

[UTexasFight 9427]

6 minutes ago, hookem2010 said:

Golds now tied at 37 with China. Do they have more bullshit events to win or should basketball put us over the top?

we’re down one 38-37.

 

Check post #1274 on the last page. 

 

[The_Great_Hornsby 3236]

10 minutes ago, hookem2010 said:

Golds now tied at 37 with China. Do they have more bullshit events to win or should basketball put us over the top?

While we are out here winning track and field and basketball. China is winning ping pong and Mandarin Speed Writing golds. 

[TonyTexas 10504]

10 minutes ago, UTexasFight said:

Usually best not to start playing that game

An interception or missed 3 pointer late in the 4th quarter of a close game always seems more impactful than one earlier in the game. 

Edited August 10 by TonyTexas

[UTexasFight 9427]

6 minutes ago, The_Great_Hornsby said:

While we are out here winning track and field and basketball. China is winning ping pong and Mandarin Speed Writing golds. 

Oh look.

they all count the same 

 

They blasted us in shooting…something we seem to be pretty good at in this country…5-1.

Edited August 10 by UTexasFight

[The_Great_Hornsby 3236]

1 minute ago, UTexasFight said:

Oh look.

they all count the same 

I am aware. That was my point. 

[Fudge Nuggets 19184]

41 minutes ago, TonyTexas said:

Our high jumper’s decision to have a jump off might cost us the gold medal race. 

The 4x100 choke job had a lot more to do with it.

[TonyTexas 10504]

10 minutes ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

The 4x100 choke job had a lot more to do with it.

 

[Napoleon 8657]

3 hours ago, Firemans4Horn said:

I fell in love again with the Olympics again. Was kind of out on it the last 15 years or so. Was my favorite sporting event as a kid by a mile. 

The great thing about the Olympics this year is how many channels you can watch to find what you want to see.

OTHER POSITIVES:

1) The team is doing well.

2) The software that makes the (female) athletes look hotter than they ever have in the past.

3) Paris backdrop makes it amazing. (Dressage on the grounds of Versailles?… YES PLEASE!! I will watch hours of that shit!)

4) Time difference allows you to watch whatever the fuck you like LIVE and then the Prime Time show is basically a 3 1/2 hour highlight show.

5) When NBC took over, they switched the Olympic coverage to prerecorded vignettes that were 3 to 6 minutes that covered the backstory of various athletes (especially female gymnasts from random countries) and then they would only show that competition for 30 minutes to an hour. 

Bob Costas would host something more akin to a soap opera than a sporting event. 

That shit is over. 

[Texzilla588 769]

Smokin’ Joe Frazier nearly drowned during the swimming event. 

Frazier also couldn’t ride a bicycle. Bob Seagren made a name pile vaulting but had no real money prospects back then. ABC loved him and invited him to Superstars. He trained hard each event like a decathlon and won it.

The hot braless celebrity chicks were on network stars.

[BurntEyes 5954]

23 minutes ago, Napoleon said:

The great thing about the Olympics this year is how many channels you can watch to find what you want to see.

5) When NBC took over, they switched the Olympic coverage to prerecorded vignettes that were 3 to 6 minutes that covered the backstory of various athletes (especially female gymnasts from random countries) and then they would only show that competition for 30 minutes to an hour. 

Bob Costas would host something more akin to a soap opera than a sporting event. 

That shit is over. 

Agree with 1-4 completely.

5 drove me away from watching the Olympics completely. I stopped giving a shit and just checked medal count online then looked for highlights.

That was far and away the worst era. 

Gymnastics, highlights of Gymnastics competitors, back story of Gymnastics lives, the dogs and cats of Gymnastic competitors, the friend of Gymnastic competitors dogs, the food of the friends of Gymnastic competitors dogs, cats and their friends, family of the dogs of Gymnastics competitors, and then, some more Gymnastics.

[PenelopeWitherspoon 19100]

The two gold medals China won in swimming have massive asterisks next to them, especially the relay medal (USA was Silver).

 

[Machinator 32099]

 

[Cairn Horn88 8259]

 

[Aqua Buddha 14581]

1 hour ago, Napoleon said:

The great thing about the Olympics this year is how many channels you can watch to find what you want to see.

OTHER POSITIVES:

1) The team is doing well.

2) The software that makes the (female) athletes look hotter than they ever have in the past.

3) Paris backdrop makes it amazing. (Dressage on the grounds of Versailles?… YES PLEASE!! I will watch hours of that shit!)

4) Time difference allows you to watch whatever the fuck you like LIVE and then the Prime Time show is basically a 3 1/2 hour highlight show.

5) When NBC took over, they switched the Olympic coverage to prerecorded vignettes that were 3 to 6 minutes that covered the backstory of various athletes (especially female gymnasts from random countries) and then they would only show that competition for 30 minutes to an hour. 

Bob Costas would host something more akin to a soap opera than a sporting event. 

That shit is over. 

To point #2, a lot of these athletes from all the countries are some good looking people.  Very telegenic.  

[Sbbruin 21825]

Down 1 gold to China.  Can win women’s hoops and women’s volleyball.

[Underdog 28543]

CNN coming up on a story that Chiles may lose her Floor bronze due to some new ruling. 

[UTexasFight 9427]

18 hours ago, UTexasFight said:

Gold medal leader talk. USA vs China.

With two days of competition remaining, the gold medal count is all tied at 33.

I am absolutely no expert in any Olympic event...(but I did wear my Kornacki khakis today). So with that said, here’s what’s going to happen.

 

tl;dr we’ll have our hands full taking the overall gold medal count. I’m giving us 4 and China 6 over the weekend. But those are what I believe to be the heavy favorites. We have more events where I think a minor ‘upset’ is more likely (women’s golf, women’s volleyball, Men’s 800m, Men’s 5000m, women’s 100m hurdles, boy’s breakdancing, men’s wrestling 97kg). I'm not really sure the Chinese have any.

Those of you that are individual sport experts, ( @Braff Zacklin looking at you for T&F) all yours for correcting comments below.

 

Times are Central

Saturday, August 10th

1:00am Men’s marathon: we each have 3 competing, but none ranked within the top 71 of the world.

2:00am Women’s golf: Final round. Closest Chinese golfer is 5 shots back of the leader (same as Nelly Korda). But only two shots back of the leader is Rose Zhang  (she’s ours…her parents migrated to the US from, you guessed it, China 2 years before she was born, but after her older brother was born. I’m going to speculate that the reason they moved to the US was China’s one-child policy. If that’s true and she can take gold, that’ll be a helluva f you to China if we end up taking the gold medal count by 1.

4:30am Weightlifting Men’s 102kg: China’s Liu Huanhua one of the strong favorites for gold. Projected China gold

5:35am Sport climbing Women's Boulder & Lead: we have one finalist (from Boulder, CO so that’s got to count for something) who finished 3rd in the prelims/semis. China has no finalist. But looks like it will take an upset to knock Slovenian Janja Garnbret from the top (pun intended)

5:40am Canoe sprint Women's Kayak Single 500m; 32 competitors left. They have 2. We have 0. No idea.

6:40am Canoe sprint Women's Canoe Single 200m Finals; we each have 1 competitor left. No idea.

7:00am Rhythmic Gymnastics Group all-around final: China was 5th in the qualification round (out of 8). We are not one of the 8.

8:00am Diving Men’s 10M platform final: China has the defending Olympic gold medal holder, who was also the leader in points in the prelims. Projected China gold

8:00am Table Tennis Women’s team gold medal match: China vs Japan. Projected China gold

12:00pm Track and Field Men’s high jump: Shelby McEwen competing for Uncle Sam. No one from China. But Italian or Qatari are favorites

12:15pm Track and Field Men’s 800m: USA Bryce Hoppel 2nd fastest time in qualifying, 1/10th of a second behind Kenyan. No Chinese in the final

12:30pm Artistic Swimming duet: Chinese are favorite. Projected China gold

12:35pm Track and Field Women’s 100m hurdles: We have the best (and 3 of the top 4) qualifying times but going to need a perfect race from Alaysha Johnson to knock off Olympic recordholder and defending gold medal champion Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico. (no Chinese in the final)

12:50pm Track and Field Men’s 5000m: We have two in the final (0 for China). Grant Fisher is our best shot at gold and should be in it at the end. We’ll see if Norwegian Jakob Ingebrigsten bonks at the end again like he did the 1500m.

1:15pm Track and Field Women’s 1500m: We have 2 in the final (0 for China) but it’s Ethiopia or Kenya’s to lose.

2:00pm Track and Field Men’s 4x400m relay: don’t fuck up the baton handoff (China not competing). Projected USA gold

2:14pm Track and Field Women’s 4x400m relay: don’t fuck up the baton handoff (China not competing). Projected USA gold

2:19pm Breaking B-boys finals:  We got Jeffro as the overall 3 seed as our best chance. China’s one entry is the worst seed (16) and in the same pool as the overall #1 seed from Japan.

2:19pm Taekwondo Men +80kg: only participants from USA and China face each other in the first round (as the 8 and 9 seeds, out of 16)

2:30pm Men’s basketball gold medal game: USA (-16.5) vs France. Go get that 4th gold, KD. Projected USA gold

2:37pm Taekwondo Women +67kg: No USA representative. Chinese have the 7 seed (out of 16)

3:34pm Boxing Women’s 75kg: China’s Li Qian won bronze in 2016 and silver in 2020 and is the favorite over Panama’s Atheyna Bylon who will become Panama’s first female Olympic medalist regardless of the outcome.  Projected China gold

 

Sunday, August 11th

1:00am Women’s marathon: we each have 3 competing, but none ranked within the top 44 of the world.

4:00am Wrestling Men’s freestyle 65kg: we have the 10 seed (out of 16). No China competitor

4:00am Wrestling Men’s freestyle 97kg: we have the 3 seed (out of 16). No China competitor

4:00am Wrestling Women’s freestyle 76kg: we each have one competing in the final 16 but neither are expected to win

4:00am Modern Pentathlon Women’s individual final: we have one competitor but neither ranked within the top 38 in the world.

4:30am Weightlifting Women’s +81kg: China’s Li Wenwen has the gold from Tokyo 2021, is the current world champion and holds the world record in the clean & jerk and snatch.. No comment. Projected China gold

6:00am Volleyball Women’s: USA (+184) vs Italy (-240). Gonna be tough.

6:23am Cycling track Men’s keirin:  They have 2 competitors out of 30. I have no idea what keirin means.

6:56am Cycling track Women’s omnium: Each have 1 competitor out of 22. I have no idea what omnium means.

8:30am Basketball Women’s: USA (-15.5) vs France. Let’s take the final gold heading to LA. Projected USA gold

We're down 39-38 in the gold count with one day to go.

We're pretty much toast, at least to win outright.

China got all 5 that I projected + gold in women's 57kg boxing, an event I didn't include in my summary. So finished the day with 39.

US got all 3 that I projected + gold in women's soccer, an event I somehow missed and didn't include in my summary. We also got the women's 100m hurdles. So finished the day with 38.

We'll each win 1 gold tomorrow (theirs in women's weightlifting +81kg, ours in women's basketball).  That leaves our women's volleyball team needing to upset Italy and a rising sophomore wrestler at Iowa taking the gold medal match in the Women's Freestyle 76kg Final to take the outright gold medal count.

[dcar00 14144]

8 minutes ago, Underdog said:

CNN coming up on a story that Chiles may lose her Floor bronze due to some new ruling. 

Gymnastics and Figure Skating...they might as well be WWE.

[Surly Bevo 24908]

The pool where we didn’t dominate at the historical norm on the men’s side is the difference

[The_Great_Hornsby 3236]

10 minutes ago, UTexasFight said:

We're down 39-38 in the gold count with one day to go.

We're pretty much toast, at least to win outright.

China got all 5 that I projected + gold in women's 57kg boxing, an event I didn't include in my summary. So finished the day with 39.

US got all 3 that I projected + gold in women's soccer, an event I somehow missed and didn't include in my summary. We also got the women's 100m hurdles. So finished the day with 38.

We'll each win 1 gold tomorrow (theirs in women's weightlifting +81kg, ours in women's basketball).  That leaves our women's volleyball team needing to upset Italy and a rising sophomore wrestler at Iowa taking the gold medal match in the Women's Freestyle 76kg Final to take the outright gold medal count.

Meh, I would settle for a gold medal tie and then we can do a jump off to determine the winner. 

[Napoleon 8657]

21 minutes ago, The_Great_Hornsby said:

Meh, I would settle for a gold medal tie and then we can do a jump off to determine the winner. 

I knew that that high jumper of ours should not have agreed to a jump off. Especially since he had to jump first. 

[Hook1997 5351]

1 hour ago, UTexasFight said:

 

We'll each win 1 gold tomorrow (theirs in women's weightlifting +81kg, ours in women's basketball).  That leaves our women's volleyball team needing to upset Italy and a rising sophomore wrestler at Iowa taking the gold medal match in the Women's Freestyle 76kg Final to take the outright gold medal count.

 

[Brisketexan 105039]

Agree with 1-4 completely.
5 drove me away from watching the Olympics completely. I stopped giving a shit and just checked medal count online then looked for highlights.
That was far and away the worst era. 
Gymnastics, highlights of Gymnastics competitors, back story of Gymnastics lives, the dogs and cats of Gymnastic competitors, the friend of Gymnastic competitors dogs, the food of the friends of Gymnastic competitors dogs, cats and their friends, family of the dogs of Gymnastics competitors, and then, some more Gymnastics.

It always ended with some version of the phrase “they touched our hearts.” Bleh.

[Braff Zacklin 13551]

7 hours ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

As much as I love Kung Fu Kenny, if we lose this gold medal count by one; then he needs to be shamed.  Fortunately for him, we're probably going to lose by more than one gold medal so no one will give a shit after the fact.

 

3 hours ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

The 4x100 choke job had a lot more to do with it.

Stahp.

Kenny fucked up, for sure, but he's won two individual medals at two different Games and will most likely return for more. He's an excellent competitor and has represented his country with honor.

There are more important things than gold medal counts. Besides, if you wanna look at what really matters (i.e., what the Olympics used to be about before it became a dog-and-pony show), check out this updated track-and-field medals table:

[WBT 20559]

3 hours ago, Napoleon said:

5) When NBC took over, they switched the Olympic coverage to prerecorded vignettes that were 3 to 6 minutes that covered the backstory of various athletes (especially female gymnasts from random countries) and then they would only show that competition for 30 minutes to an hour. 

Bob Costas would host something more akin to a soap opera than a sporting event. 

That shit is over. 

Thank God.

I've been steeaming stuff in the background all week at work.  The equestrian at Versailles, mountain biking, road biking, and triathlon were great for that along with whatever team sport games looked interesting.  When I get home I'll stream anything else I really want to see, definitely all the swimming and track.  During primetime I'd flip to NBC or USA when they were replaying anything I wanted to see.  I can’t say I partook any Snoop or Kevin and Keenan bits, nttawwt, but the coverage is really excellent now.

One thing I wonder about is how long they'll leave everything up to revisit or watch things I missed.

[Welshy 907]

5 minutes ago, WBT said:

Thank God.

I've been steeaming stuff in the background all week at work.  The equestrian at Versailles, mountain biking, road biking, and triathlon were great for that along with whatever team sport games looked interesting.  When I get home I'll stream anything else I really want to see, definitely all the swimming and track.  During primetime I'd flip to NBC or USA when they were replaying anything I wanted to see.  I can’t say I partook any Snoop or Kevin and Keenan bits, nttawwt, but the coverage is really excellent now.

One thing I wonder about is how long they'll leave everything up to revisit or watch things I missed.

 

I didn't miss a thing!

 

[BurntEyes 5954]

4 hours ago, The_Great_Hornsby said:

Meh, I would settle for a gold medal tie and then we can do a jump off to determine the winner. 

That or a game of 3x3 but US gets to use Curry, LeBron and KD.

That's a 3x3 that would be fun to watch.

[DigglerontheHoof 21167]

3 hours ago, Braff Zacklin said:

 

Stahp.

Kenny fucked up, for sure, but he's won two individual medals at two different Games and will most likely return for more. He's an excellent competitor and has represented his country with honor.

There are more important things than gold medal counts. Besides, if you wanna look at what really matters (i.e., what the Olympics used to be about before it became a dog-and-pony show), check out this updated track-and-field medals table:

Gracias, was just looking for the T/F medal count. 

[mininghorn88 2275]

Currently I am in China right now watching the Olympics on CCTV. I have no idea about what they are saying but it is non-stop coverage of all of the finals without commercials.

[Braff Zacklin 13551]

51 minutes ago, mininghorn88 said:

Currently I am in China right now watching the Olympics on CCTV. I have no idea about what they are saying but it is non-stop coverage of all of the finals without commercials.

Bring home lots of neodymium.

[perfectchaos007 6621]

I do think this ends up as a 40 to 40 tie, but anything can happen